Tom Patterson is a middle school band director at Deerpark Middle School with an extensive background in the history of music. One of band director Tom Patterson's favorite subjects is the history of musical instruments. Tom Patterson has researched many instruments across many cultures. One of the more interesting of these instruments, noted band director Tom Patterson, is the flute.
From prehistoric times to the present, said band director Tom Patterson, the flute has undergone many changes and refinements. The flute, instructed Tom Patterson, is the oldest crafted instrument in human history. It is true, said the band director, that drums predate flutes, but early drums were not crafted. Tom Patterson explained early humans merely beat on rocks or wood to make the first drums. By comparison, noted Tom Patterson, the first flutes were carved from the bones of hunted animals.
Band director Tom Patterson said that archeologists have dated the first bone flutes to about 35,000 years ago. Tom Patterson commented that this is an astonishing lifespan for a musical instrument. Later flutes, continued band director Tom Patterson, were short instruments made out of wood, similar to what we today call a recorder.
As the millennia rolled by, said Tom Patterson, flutes became more elaborate and standardized. The band director described how flutes took on longer forms to accommodate more holes. Band director Tom Patterson explained that the more holes and stops a flute contains, the greater its tonal range. Eventually, said band director Tom Patterson, as collective human technology improved, flutes were crafted out of more sophisticated materials. Tom Patterson described beautiful ancient flutes made out of blown glass, for example, which produced even more dulcet tones.
In more modern times, said Tom Patterson, the flute took on a metal body and very complex fingerings. Band director Tom Patterson noted the flute has come a long way from a bored bone or stick drilled with bare holes stopped by bare fingers. Since the 1500s, explained Tom Patterson, the flute has become a complicated metal contraption loaded with springs, keys and pads. But the band director reminded readers, as much as the flute itself has changed, the sweet inspirational music it produces is as timeless as ever.
